India's Richest Man Takes On Zoom
India's Reliance Jio Platforms, which recently concluded a $15.2 billion fundraise run, is ready to enter a new business: Video conferencing. On Thursday evening, the firm -- backed by Mukesh Ambani, India's richest man -- formally launched JioMeet, its video-conference service that looks uncannily like Zoom. Like Zoom and Google Meet, JioMeet offers unlimited number of free calls in high definition (720p) to users and supports as many as 100 participants on a call. But interestingly, it's not imposing a short time limit on a call's duration. Jio Platforms says a call can be "up to 24 hours" long. The service currently has no paid plans and it's unclear if Jio Platforms, which has a reputation of giving away services for free for years, plans to change that.
Jio Platforms, which began beta testing JioMeet in May this year, said the video conferencing service offers "enterprise-grade" host controls. These include: password protection on each call, multi-device login support (up to five devices), and ability to share screen and collaborate. Other features include the ability to switch "seemingly" from one device to another, and a 'Safe Driving Mode' for when a participant is in commute. Hosts can also enable a 'waiting room' to ensure participants have to ask for permission to enter a call. The company did not provide any more details, including whether people outside of India could use the service. On its website, JioMeet claims all the meetings are "encrypted" but does not elaborate whether these calls are end-to-end encrypted.
India's Reliance Jio Platforms, which recently concluded a $15.2 billion fundraise run, is ready to enter a new business: Video conferencing. On Thursday evening, the firm -- backed by Mukesh Ambani, India's richest man -- formally launched JioMeet, its video-conference service that looks uncannily like Zoom. Like Zoom and Google Meet, JioMeet offers unlimited number of free calls in high definition (720p) to users and supports as many as 100 participants on a call. But interestingly, it's not imposing a short time limit on a call's duration. Jio Platforms says a call can be "up to 24 hours" long. The service currently has no paid plans and it's unclear if Jio Platforms, which has a reputation of giving away services for free for years, plans to change that.
Jio Platforms, which began beta testing JioMeet in May this year, said the video conferencing service offers "enterprise-grade" host controls. These include: password protection on each call, multi-device login support (up to five devices), and ability to share screen and collaborate. Other features include the ability to switch "seemingly" from one device to another, and a 'Safe Driving Mode' for when a participant is in commute. Hosts can also enable a 'waiting room' to ensure participants have to ask for permission to enter a call. The company did not provide any more details, including whether people outside of India could use the service. On its website, JioMeet claims all the meetings are "encrypted" but does not elaborate whether these calls are end-to-end encrypted.